Out of Line
by eyrror
Summary: Keith carefully reflects on what he told Shiro when he was fighting his clone, confused and knowing that Shiro wasn't quite his brother but never having anyone else to compare these feelings to. Shiro knew, but promised himself he'd be patient with the man he loved back.


Keith had been telling Shiro that he'd seen the man as a brother for years now, but Shiro always had a feeling it ran deeper and was misunderstood. He knew from the longing glances, the soft expression the man always fitted Shiro with, and the way Keith acted out by hitting boys in his class yet never paying any mind to girls. It almost reminded him of himself before he came out. He would be patient with Keith. The way he wasn't with himself.

Having Kuron's memories as well as his own, Shiro knew that Keith had told him he loved him, even if he didn't truly know how. Keith was ready to die with him, and he couldn't quite shake that level of sacrifice. He never wanted Keith to die for him, or die in his place. He'd already died once and come back. The thought of Keith sacrificing himself indefinitely, as independent and selfish as the other paladins may view him, left him rattled.

"I think we need to talk," Shiro stated slowly, his eyes slowly meeting Keith's in the aftermath of a luxurious victory meal Coran and Allura prepared after their final fight with Lotor. They stood alone in the foyer between the lavish dining room and their living quarters, Shiro's single hand on his hip and expression serious, and the new gloss of white hair certainly gave him a slightly more foreboding appearance. Seeing Shiro's entire head of ghost white hair would certainly take some getting used to.

"I think so, too." Keith would be a fool to think this would be about anything other than Shiro catching his longing glances ever since the white-haired Black Paladin had returned. It felt like too long since he'd last seen the man, let alone the real him.

"I heard what you said. When you fought Kuron."

Apparently Keith was wrong. This would be a very different conversation.

"Did you mean it?" Shiro continued, tilting his head ever so slightly in question.

"That you're my brother? Sure," the raven shrugged, not thinking anything of it and hoping he could get out of the fact he'd said those three words for the first time in his life.

"No," Shiro denied. "You said…" It seemed as though Shiro was almost too embarrassed to continue. Keith wasn't sure why Shiro was approaching the subject so timidly. He'd always referred to Shiro as his brother, and saying he loved him afterwards didn't contradict that. That's what people did with family. They told them they loved them.

"Is there anything to say, really?" Keith muttered, crossing his arms, hoping that his impatience with the situation would force some answers from Shiro's hesitation. "I love you, and you're my brother. You always have been."

"That's not how it seemed, Keith." Such sympathy, the raven noted, wishing he felt little enough to scowl. "I know that I stepped in when your father passed, but I don't think that even with him, you would have been so quick to die with him. Or with Krolia. You could've saved yourself, what with how self-preserving and independent you've always been, but you held onto me after everything _he'd_ said."

When Keith didn't say anything and just stared at him, doubt and fear of rejection playing on his features, Shiro plead quietly: "Keith, you've saved me so many times. At least let me do the same."

"It was a tense moment. That's all. It felt like the right thing to say," Keith responded quickly with a downward cast gaze and stiff jaw, sounding far too defensive. Shiro realized that the raven wasn't ready to broach the topic just yet, so the white-haired paladin looked away and nodded.

"I understand." Shiro didn't make a move to touch the raven's shoulder like he usually did during talks like this. It felt better to give him space, even if it was the last thing either of them wanted.

The next several days, Shiro felt Keith pulling away. He'd always been shy and averse to facing his feelings, but this felt far more severe than usual. When they were heading for Earth, Keith avoided spending time alone with him. Initially, the team assumed that Keith was still dealing with the emotional fallout of having to chop Shiro's arm off in a tense fight, but began to notice the odd change in behavior extended to an acute irritability towards the rest of Voltron, too.

After a particularly volatile reaction to Lance prodding Keith on whether he was excited to return to his isolated 'little shack,' Allura decided to approach Shiro about the matter of Keith's sour temper. It seemed the closer they got to Earth, the worse off Keith acted, almost as if it connected somehow to his family.

"Shiro, you need to talk with him," Allura stated softly, touching the paladin's elbow to request his attention in the matter.

"I'm not sure he wants to talk, in all honesty," Shiro sighed, pressing his lips into a tight line.

"Perhaps not, but he needs to. And you're the only person that he'll entertain such a conversation from." She tilted her head expectantly, and Shiro couldn't stand having to turn her down, no matter how good her intentions to keep peace were.

"I know you're right. I will, but give him some time. He's still reeling from everything that's happened. Lance reminding him of the fact he was an orphan once again after I left for Kerberos surely didn't help," Shiro responded tersely, looking down the hallway that Keith had just stormed down.

"Certainly. I trust you completely in this matter, Shiro," Allura concluded empathetically, turning to return to speaking with Coran about how to approach Earth without alerting its airspace to their presence with Pidge and Hunk. Lance sat off to the side of the conversation, still pouting over being yelled at by the former Red Paladin.

Shiro approached him with a reassuring hand on his shoulder and a small smile. "Don't take it to heart, all right? You didn't mean it the way he took it."

"Yeah, but it _was_ douchey. I just wanted to kind of get under his skin like I used to, but that was a little too easy," the brunette huffed a humorless laugh. "Definitely not gonna try again. He's been on edge ever since he came back. I used to think it was you, but now I'm starting to wonder if it's all of us."

"Lance," Shiro began, sensing that Lance was starting to spiral and would inevitably end up chastising himself for things he had no control over. "I promise it's not about you. If anything, it's me." This seemed to calm Lance, if only a little, and Shiro decided to dedicate the rest of his time waiting for Keith's temper to calm by catching up with Lance and even having some somewhat discreet conversations about his feelings for Allura.

After half an hour, Shiro stood up from the lounge pit and looked over at Allura, who met his glance with a supportive smile. He nodded at her, taking his leave and heading towards Keith's quarters, secluded far away from the rest of the paladin's bunks. When he reached the raven's door, he didn't need to try it to know it was locked, but he still hesitated and breathed out a deep sigh before attempting to get Keith's attention.

"Keith?" Shiro called against the locked door, knocking on it almost too gingerly. After a stir but no response, the white-haired paladin knocked once more. Like last time, he didn't hear anything suggesting Keith wanted to speak from the other side of the door.

"If you're not ready to talk, it's all right. I'll come back later," Shiro said with an unending, tender patience that Keith never felt he warranted. As soon as the paladin made to turn his back and return to the bridge, Keith's door whirred open. He looked panicked and vulnerable and his eyes were red-rimmed.

Shiro wrapped his arm around Keith on instinct and pulled the shorter male tightly to his chest. He'd seen this face on Keith several times when he was a younger, more timid child, though fiery nonetheless. Usually it happened when Shiro left for the Garrison each semester and Keith knew Shiro couldn't come back until his classes had concluded; he knew it always tore the raven-haired boy apart but he couldn't help it. When Keith was old enough to apply for the Garrison, Shiro had pulled some strings to make sure the younger boy had got in so he would be able to see him more.

"Don't go," Keith said quietly with his face in Shiro's shoulder and fingers curling in the taller male's flight suit. All the Black Paladin could see was a younger Keith standing on the porch of his rundown home outside town, pleading with him not to leave again. "I've already lost you too many times," he breathed, and Shiro snapped back to the present with a taller, more mature, but still too pragmatic Keith.

"I promise you won't lose me again," Shiro assured him, holding tighter and pressing his nose into the crown of Keith's head. He felt the head below him nod side-to-side and laugh bitterly. It made Shiro pull away, the two of them still standing in the open doorway.

With uncertainty, Shiro's eyes met Keith's, unsteady but holding it together, not unlike the both of them.

"You can't promise me that, Shiro," the raven smiled, but it came nowhere near reaching his eyes. It hardly registered on his lips.

"I know," Shiro frowned. He wanted to reach up and cup the younger's face. To do something to reassure him without crossing a line. "But even knowing that, I'm positive you'll always bring me back. You always find me."

Keith shook his head again, sighing and seeming almost amused. He took a step back and turned around, and Shiro saw this as a sign to enter the room since it wasn't slid shut in his face like it had been a couple times since the two of them had returned. Once they were both inside, Keith clicked the panel next to the door and shut it, taking a seat on his bed.

"Yeah, you can count on that. I won't let you go easily." He even laughed a little and his eyes softened. Keith looked a little lighter, a little younger, a little more like he did before they found out the truth about Lotor.

"I know what I _can_ promise you, though," Shiro smiled, stepping up to where Keith sat on the corner of his bed to place a strong hand on the raven's shoulder. "I will _never_ give up on you, Keith. Do you know why?"

"Am I supposed to say something about family?" Keith rolled his eyes, knowing Shiro was probably going to try and broach this subject again, whether he liked it or not. Might as well face it head on.

"I don't know, are you?" Shiro countered, tilting his head and quirking a brow in expectation.

Keith locked his jaw at this, throwing a half-hearted glare at the other paladin. It was something only an authority figure could say when they were forcing you to find out the answer to a problem yourself. It infuriated Keith when anyone did this, but Shiro was allowed to get away with it.

After staring one another down for a dobosh, Keith was the first to smile. Then Shiro. Keith looked away after a moment, knowing that if he allowed himself any longer, he would end up staring after the man's charming smile.

"I think I realized something about myself that I'd been hiding for a long time," Keith began, still refusing to meet Shiro's eyes.

"Okay," the Black Paladin responded in an effort to urge Keith to continue and also assure him that he was listening while he took a seat on the bed to the left of the other paladin.

"I'm gay."

"Is that something you're all right with?" Shiro asked, looking at Keith intently. Once again, it was an infuriatingly fatherly thing to ask. If Keith was going to have any luck explaining his poor behavior the past several weeks, Shiro needed to knock this off.

"It's something I'll have to be okay with. I don't have a choice," Keith responded casually, flicking his hands from resting on his knees to opening towards the ceiling. "I wish I could tell you I figured it out the way normal kids do," he laughed. When Shiro furrowed his brows, Keith sighed and continued. "Like with porn or something. But it was different, and a far larger pain in the ass."

If Shiro had caught his casually-inserted pun, he was too polite to laugh in the midst of the serious conversation. "That's all right. I'm still listening," Shiro smiled softly and placed a reassuring hand on the raven-haired man's knee.

"I almost never feel like this about anyone. There was one guy back in the Garrison when I was first going through puberty," Keith began, staring ahead of himself to jog his memory. "But after that, there's only been one person."

Shiro waited patiently for Keith to finish, allowing him to take his time. He thought to remove his hand, but was concerned that it would signal some rejection of Keith's identity if he broke contact at this point, so his hand remained. To Keith, it felt like Shiro's hand was branding his skin.

"I thought I saw you as my brother. And it would've made sense. But it's more complicated than that. I just…" Keith looked directly away from Shiro and took a deep breath, balling his hands into fists on the side of his legs. "I don't recall ever feeling so strongly about someone, so I was scared. And closeted. And I didn't want to hurt our friendship and I know I'm already probably doing that right now by saying any of this, but it's better than keeping it in for the rest of my life when I never know when I could lose you again. When you could _die_ again."

Keith could hear his pulse in his ears, and he still felt Shiro's gaze trained intently on him. His admission felt like a wave of relief and torrential hurricane all at once. It was dangerous and dawning, but he couldn't hold the flood gates any longer. It hurt him and it was hurting the team every time he held back how he truly felt, pent up feelings leaking out like acid sowing turmoil in so few words. This would at least lessen those outbursts, he hoped.

When Shiro's hand disappeared from his knee, Keith quickly looked up to meet Shiro's eyes in a mix of horror and fear, only for him to replace the hand against the raven's cheek, cupping it and gently pulling his chin up to press their lips together softly at first. Then when wide-eyed Keith processed that the best thing he could have hoped for was already happening, his eyes slipped shut as he pressed back and Shiro deepened the kiss when he scooted closer to Keith.

The former Red Paladin's hands rose to both rest on a thick neck and the scruff of Shiro's stark white hair, pulling himself closer. Before long, they had both pulled away to breathe and look each other in the eyes, assessing whether this was truly happening after all these years.

"When?" Keith breathed out, eyes intense and shining with tears soon to fall.

"When I told you I wanted you to lead Voltron if I didn't make it."

"But you were gone so soon after," Keith countered, confused.

"I could always see you from within the Black Lion. And within Kuron's consciousness," Shiro smiled, bending down to kiss Keith on the corner of his lips, then pressing a wet kiss to his cheek, earning himself a chuckle. "That was still me. Some of the time. Until the witch shut me out the final time. I could see, but only glances."

Keith's expression held reservations still unbroken from their initial conversation about the battle. "When I said I loved you." The raven whispered, his brow furrowing.

"I saw you so clearly at that moment. It was like I was still alive again. I was almost able to come back and touch you. For a couple of seconds." Shiro smiled and Keith lost the ability to breathe. He still wasn't sure how Shiro would feel, especially given his confession.

"I love you."

It was said plain as day, as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. Keith felt his world soften into a pale blur. "Why do you think it was always you I reached out to? The witch even knew it, somehow. We were always the key to each other's downfalls and even our greatest strengths." Shiro leaned close, pressing his forehead to Keith's affectionately, his single hand carding through dark hair. "Every plot in the universe drove us apart, but fate always pulled us back together."

"Fate had nothing to do with it," Keith scoffed. "My bullheadedness did."

Shiro chuckled at this, placing a chaste kiss against the raven's lips, sucking the bottom one gently and prompting a small noise to rise in Keith's throat. He'd always adored that stubbornness and refusal to give up Keith had. Gaining more courage, Keith kissed Shiro with the passion he'd been holding onto and holding back for years, using it to push the elder down against the bed and cradle his body.

"As long as you want to be by my side, I will save you. As many times as it takes." He pushed nervous hands through white hair, caressing but pulling, not sure whether to be rough in his anticipation or gentle in his affection.

"You'll be keeping that promise a long time," Shiro smiled up at Keith from the standard issue comforter, allowing his hand to rest on the raven's waist as he moved himself up the bed and used his hips to move Keith along with him to allow themselves more room.

"I intend to." Keith stated confidently, swooping down to claim quirked lips in an ever-uncertain bristling electric energy, knowing enough and nothing all at once as he moved his lips from the Black Paladin's lips to his jaw and neck, nipping playfully and sucking in alternation. Both feeling and hearing a low groan, Keith continued with a small smirk, reaching behind the paladin to unzip his flight suit only to find he was all but nude underneath.

"Hey, don't laugh," Shiro pouted, eyeing Keith's tightly pressed lips that were certainly quirked into some semblance of a smile.

"You were expecting something like this when you knocked on my door, huh?"

"No!" He immediately answered, anxiety and terror evident on his features. Keith knew that wasn't like Shiro, but he had to tease. "It's just ridiculously hard getting anything on now with only one arm…"

It wasn't even an accusation, but the raven found himself apologizing as he peeled the flight suit down Shiro's waist, then kissing the offended shoulder softly. Shiro simply huffed a sigh and rolled his eyes, holding back a smile as Keith's mouth began to trail over a nipple, dragging teeth and tongue to render it pebble-hard on his torturously long way down the man's torso as he drug the flight suit with it, revealing an erect cock standing at attention. Keith was both surprised and entirely too excited, pressing his face against the length of Shiro's cock and briefly breathing hotly on it before licking up the shaft experimentally. When said course of actions coaxed a moan from the other paladin, Keith moved to the top and licked around it and quickly swallowed it down.

While rather inexperienced, it didn't exactly show on Keith's part, nor did Shiro even seem to care. The man seemed to be enjoying himself rapturously, his single good hand tangled in Keith's dark locks, longer than he remembered but easier to twist in his fingers. The moment Keith looked up with Shiro's thick cock widening his lips, the Black Paladin swore he would've came right then had he any less control. Regardless, he gently pulled Keith's hair, urging him off of his cock, to which Keith narrowed his eyes at Shiro and disregarded the request completely, once again sucking Shiro down his throat and hollowing out his cheeks, eliciting a long, needy groan from the other paladin.

Trying to steady his breaths, Shiro leaned his head back against the bed, willing himself to last by parting his focus between Keith's hot mouth and wanting to enjoy this just a little longer. "Keith, wait, I'm too close," he panted, once again trying to pull Keith off but with just enough force to halt him this time.

"I'm only stopping for one reason," Keith bluntly stated, licking his palm to lubricate it and sliding it along Shiro's leaking length. Eyes fluttering shut and mouth meaning to ask, Shiro was thankful when the raven decided to finish his thought without prompting: "I want you inside of me."

"Are...are you sure?" Shiro sputtered, shifting so that he was sitting up once more, Keith now in his lap and leaning down to offer an open-mouthed kiss that the Black Paladin could taste himself in. He reached his behind the raven and pulled down the zipper from his Blade of Marmora suit, revealing a tight black tank and matching black compression shorts which prominently displayed the outline of his neglected, painfully hard cock. Shiro did his best to mask the impressed sigh he let out, being able to gaze at Keith's body in all its glory without fear of reproach from the owner himself. The reaction did not go unnoticed by Keith as he pivoted his hips to the side to relieve his legs from the confines of the suits' remains, especially when Shiro placed a tentative hand on his ass, brushing it all too lightly.

Keith rolled his eyes with a playful smirk, taking Shiro's hand and planting it more firmly on his ass, fingers bridging the cheeks of his buttocks. With this newfound permission, the Black Paladin's hand grasped and squeezed with more confidence but still the same amount of restrained desire that the raven was determined to divest him of. Angling himself back on Shiro's lap, he made sure to grind his ass down on the naked member beneath his compression shorts, tight and thin enough that it felt like there was hardly anything between them, causing both Keith and Shiro to moan.

Shiro bucked his hips into Keith for good measure, a fleshy hand grasping a sculpted hip till knuckles turned white. "Keith…" He murmured, eyebrows knit and eyes searching desperately for something he didn't know how to ask for. To which the Red Paladin merely let off a single-syllable laugh, smiling and pulling the tank over his head and tossing it into the corner of the room as Shiro did the honors of peeling the compression shorts and running his nails over Keith's bare ass while he buried his face in the younger's neck, kissing it and pulling skin into his teeth with enough suction to leave a mark at least for the night.

"Do you have lube?" He panted, his hand coming down to grasp Keith's cock, leaking with precum, and stroking it slowly before the latter pulled away to kick off the skin-tight bottoms.

"Yeah, but you might not need much of it," Keith responded sheepishly, reaching into a bedside drawer to retrieve an unmarked bottle.

Once Shiro had coated his fingers with a small amount of lube, his index finger circled Keith's entrance. Keith was keeled over with his hands on Shiro's shoulders, steadying himself just enough but not too much so as to knock the both of them over. He shivered against the Black Paladin's capable chest as the finger teased him, kneeling with his cock jutting into the pane of Shiro's abdomen as the man plunged a single finger into the raven's quivering hole while he kissed the hollow of his throat affectionately, only to find he must've prepared himself before.

"Did you…" Shiro began inquisitively, looking up from his place at Keith's collarbone.

"Sort of. I've kind of suddenly been having the urge to get off far more often," he responded impishly, looking to the wall behind Shiro instead of making eye contact. "Repressing yourself does that, I guess."

"I'll try not to be too thankful you waited this long, then," Shiro smiled, diving back down to kiss at Keith's pale shoulders, pushing and pulling the digit in a steady rhythm before adding a second, then another finger in.

"Shiro…" Keith all but whined, his voice strained and stuck in the middle of his throat. Shiro knew that teasing could wait till another time. Now, what they needed was each other after all the years of waiting and yearning and defeated self-defeating prophecies. They finally had one another and were tangled in an odd number of limbs and scars, asymmetrical and beautiful, as Shiro kissed the newly adorned mark on the left side of Keith's face. He removed his fingers from Keith, who resisted whimpering at the loss of contact only for the same hand to gently push him back until his ass met the blunt head of Shiro's cock. Taking the unspoken instruction, Keith slowly sank himself down onto Shiro while the man held his length steady, the both of them breathing hotly against one another with their groans low and alternating, mixing and losing their owners in the heat and myriad of sensations and sounds.

When Shiro had bottomed out inside of Keith, he pulled the other male close with an arm around his waist and merlot purple eyes met midnight black. They stared like that for what could've been deca-phoebs were they never in a hurry for the rest of their lives, frozen in the moment and how right it all finally felt, as if this is where they were supposed to be all along. As if on cue, the two of them smiled and Keith immediately cradled Shiro's face in his palms, calloused from knife and sword handling.

The Black Paladin felt himself leaning forth into the embrace, closing his eyes in bliss and feeling merely seconds later a pair of soft lips and a pillowy tongue against his, pleading entrance and intimacy beyond what they already were privy to. In the same moment, Shiro felt Keith begin to move, pulling himself off and then thrusting himself back down onto the elder male's engorged cock, wringing moans from both parties. He moved his good hand onto Keith's hip, ready to slow the man if needed. Shiro needed to last, needed to give Keith everything he'd been yearning for, and even to satisfy his own carnal cravings. "Keith…" Shiro sighed, leaning his head back every so slightly, then forcing his neck to pick back up so that he could look up at the raven as he bounced on his cock to pleasure himself. "You are so perfect, and I love you so much."

Chest filled to the brim with lovely, warm feelings, Keith did his best to hold back tears and focused on the repetitive sound of his balls smacking against Shiro's as he rode the man's cock into oblivion. Reaching down, Keith began to stroke himself off, only to cum on his third stroke with a breathy moan and beautiful parted cherry lips that would haunt Shiro's dreams and wake him hard for weeks to come.

Exhausted, Keith still lazily thrust himself back onto Shiro, but the Black Paladin took this as a prime opportunity to gently and slowly direct the raven to lie on his back. When Keith had more or less caught his breath and Shiro was satisfied with the number of kisses he'd peppered over the other male's face, neck, and chest, he began to move once more inside of Keith. First, he was slow and listened to the euphoric melody of strained whimpering moans dripping from his lover's lips like golden honey.

Addicted and determined to wrench more of this sounds from the Red Paladin, Shiro began to pick up his pace with the faith that Keith's post-orgasm oversensitivity was waning. Keith's pleasure became ever more apparent in his soft member slowly returning to attention, dually so when the other male adjusted his angle to drive his cock deeper inside. After a couple thrusts, Shiro had found that perfect spot inside of Keith that he would use to drive them both over the edge. With a strong hand wrapped around a slim hip and taut abdomen, Shiro began thrusting harder and letting himself groan and whisper words of loving encouragement to Keith as he pounded mercilessly into the man's prostate.

"Shiro, god, I can't," the raven choked out, every other word punctuated by the slap of flesh and an accompanying moan. Keith could and would.

"You're okay, baby. I'm here. I'll always be here so long as I have any choice in the matter," Shiro assured him, leaning down for a second to place a passionate kiss on his lips before fucking them to completion. Keith soon came once more with a strangled whimper, tossing his head to the side and screwing his eyes shut, with Shiro not far behind with a strong, concluding thrust into Keith's prostate and a rumbling low groan of satisfaction.

A few moments of catching humid breaths between their mouths, lazy but passion-filled kisses, and love-laden glances later, Shiro slowly pulled his softened cock from Keith and lied down beside the raven, pressing his face into the dark tresses he'd always adored.

"Was that okay?" Shiro asked, suddenly self conscious with eyebrows knit and onyx eyes concerned.

"It was far better than okay, Shiro," Keith chuckled, kissing his forehead. "That was everything I'd ever wanted. Don't worry about it, seriously."

"I definitely can't promise to ever stop worrying about you, Keith," he responded seriously, though he wasn't in a position to emphasize his point by meeting the raven's eyes.

"I didn't ask you to stop," Keith smiled so honestly and openly that Shiro's heart ached After which, the raven shifted so that he could lay his head on Shiro's chest with one hand wrapped around the other paladin's neck and the other draped across his chest, occasionally fondling the severed, protected circuitry of the prosthetic. Shiro hummed in approval, curling his arm around Keith affectionately. It was the happiest Shiro had been since he'd finally accepted his own sexuality, but he was even happier because Keith was far easier on himself than Shiro ever had been in the same circumstances.


End file.
